


the gold road's sure a long road

by brokendrums



Series: like sunshine and rain [1]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Anal Sex, Canon Compliant, Friends With Benefits, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-26
Updated: 2016-01-26
Packaged: 2018-05-16 08:25:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5821234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokendrums/pseuds/brokendrums
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Niall picks up Harry from the airport and they spend the afternoon together before Niall goes to Australia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the gold road's sure a long road

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Fool's Gold - The Stone Roses. 
> 
> Thanks to [herstrionics](https://archiveofourown.org/users/herstrionics) for a reassuring read through!

“Sorry,” Niall says when Harry first gets into the car. It’s hard to hear over the sound of shutters and the shouts of the paparazzi.

“You’re late,” Harry says accusingly as Niall pulls away from the curb. He’s still tangled in his bag, the strap caught behind his arm as he reaches for the seat belt. He’s mostly not sitting on it though. At least, that’s a plus. 

Niall shrugs from the driver’s seat. “So are you.”

Harry rolls his eyes. He had stayed a few extra days in England before flying out. It had been a last minute change in plans but Harry had enjoyed himself. 

Niall’s got an elbow propped up on the ridge underneath the door window and the other one is resting down at the bottom of the wheel. He looks utterly relaxed for someone who rarely drives on this side of the road. 

“Have you been helping yourself to the garage?” Harry asks as they finally break away from the traffic and head towards the exit. Niall makes it look easy and Harry had forgotten how nice it was to let him drive for once in awhile. He looks good -- the slope of his nose, the rough of stubble he’s got growing up the side of his jaw. Harry wishes they could go on a roadtrip, go wherever _they_ want to go. They’ve been out on the road for so long but so rarely got to make any of the decisions themselves, to see what they wanted to see. He thinks that Niall would look good taking charge behind the wheel of Harry’s Jag, the open road stretching out in front of them. 

Niall barely glances at him. He’s got sunglasses on so Harry can’t see his expression properly but he can tell by the quiver of his mouth that he’s fighting a smile. “Had to do something to wile away the days without the host.”

Harry snorts. He very much doubts that Niall was bored in the few days he was in LA without him. Niall’s brought a herd of cousins with him as per usual. The house was hardly quiet.

“Must’ve been hard,” Harry plays along. He’s staring at him now, waiting for when he breaks. 

“Like watching paint dry,” Niall sighs, as if he’s hard done by. He shakes his head slowly. “Absolutely shite weeks holiday. Golf course every morning, a few beers by the pool. Personal sushi chef in the guest house. We even had to head out to the beach to get ice cream. In January! _Without_ a coat.”

“Diabolical!” Harry hits his fist off the dashboard and can’t quite control how hard he’s grinning. “I can’t quite believe it.”

Niall snorts, despite himself and Harry settles back into the seat as the road opens up in front of them. It’s sunny today, a nice warmth that has to be more than double what he left behind him at home. He’s got a scarf tucked into the side pocket of his bag and he’ll never have to use it but it’s a soft wool and a gift from his mum-via-Robin so he brought it with him anyway. 

Harry smiles, reclines his chair a bit. He doesn’t know why everyone doesn’t spend winter away. The sun beats through the window and Harry can feel the warmth of it on his eyelids when he lets his eyes slide closed for longer than a blink.

“Missed you _loads_ ,” Niall says sarcastically. He turns his head, just as much as he can get away with when he’s driving to look at Harry. 

Harry grins, finally getting a glimpse of his irises through the sepia of his sunglasses. Harry recognises them from some he picked up last time he was in LA just before Christmas. Niall must’ve found his stash. “Oh well, I missed you too.”

Niall smiles, licks his lips and then turns back to the road like he didn’t say anything. 

Harry falls asleep on the 405, giving into the pull of jetlag and how it feels like it’s already after midnight. Niall doesn’t wake him until they’re five minutes out, the car creeping steadily up the climb, the sun high above them. 

The gate clangs open and Harry’s nearly shocked at how familiar it feels. He doesn’t quite let himself believe that it feels like home. Harry wipes at his eyes as they pull up in front of the house. Niall parks in the middle of the drive and even though no-one else will be in or out all evening, it’s hard not to feel like he’s just abandoning it there. 

“There’s a proper space for it, y’know,” Harry can’t help but say. 

Niall snorts, shoving his sunglasses up onto his forehead. “There’s a proper space and there’s your space.”

Harry grimaces, he’ll open his front door and find the entire house misplaced or reorganised since Niall’s been staying. Harry’s space and Niall’s space. Between them, they’ll never be able to find the remote control for weeks. 

Niall reaches for Harry’s carry-on but Harry bats him away. “It’s heavy,” he explains. He never brings a case on these flights -- everything he needs is here and if it isn’t, he can buy it -- but he’s got a few extras that his mum got him for Christmas that he had to take with him. Niall nods and slides out of the seat, appearing a head shorter because of how tall the Range Rover is. 

It’s warmer outside the comforting envelope of the AC, sun hitting his courtyard driveway perfectly. Niall leads the way to the door, his keys dangling from his back pocket on an old tour lanyard, so faded it could belong to any band. Harry remembers the day he had gotten them cut. He’d sent one to his mum, out of habit. Even though a key all the way back in England wouldn’t really help if he got locked out in the rain. He’d given the other set to Niall for no other particular reason than it had felt right. 

Now. Now they look like they belong there.

“Hey,” Harry says, reaching out for Niall’s shoulder. 

They pause on the doorstep, Niall’s mouth slowly turning up into a smile. “Hi.”

Harry laughs and presses in for a kiss. He had been worried back in the car, with anyone and their wide angle lens looking in. But here, on his blissfully camera-free front doorstep, he can kiss whoever he wants. 

“Missed you,” Niall murmurs against his lips and this time, he sounds painfully genuine. 

Harry answers him with his lips. 

They kiss until Harry has him pressed against the door, one of Niall’s hands caught in his grip and pushed against the wood and the other hooked into the waistband of Harry’s jeans. Niall doesn’t taste of anything and Harry’s glad he took a moment to brush his teeth before they landed at LAX, his tongue pressed against Niall’s like this. 

“Come on,” Niall says, pulling away to pant breathlessly in Harry’s face. It tickles but Harry doesn’t want to look away from him. Now that they’ve started to properly pay attention to each other, he doesn’t want to stop. “I told the lads to fuck off for the afternoon.”

Harry groans. “Have I ever told you I love you?”

Niall smirks, kisses him again. His lips are warm and soft and slippery wet when Harry licks at them, teasing out that sound he likes from the back of Niall’s throat. 

Harry doesn’t make it particularly easy for Niall to get the door open and it feels like role-reversal as Harry lets Niall lope off to the cupboard to punch in the security code. The house looks the same, just a little more lived in. There’s a cup sitting on the corner of the marble island in the kitchen and a pair of shoes kicked on their side near the door. It’s when Harry sees the pile of luggage in the living room that Harry remembers. 

“You’re leaving,” he says dumbly, eyes still frozen on the suitcases. 

Niall looks over from the cloak room. He’s got his hand still raised for the code but the alarm has stopped it’s warning beep. “Yeah. Melbourne.”

Harry feels his stomach sink. He had forgotten that Niall would be going off there soon. “Are you already packed?”

Something flashes over Niall’s face -- guilt or annoyance, Harry can’t tell. “Yeah, flight is tonight.”

Harry actually audibly groans. “Tonight? But I just got here.”

“Martin starts back to work soon. We need to get over and settled.”

“You don’t need to get settled,” Harry says and tries to pretend that he doesn’t sound like a petulant child. 

Niall’s face hardens slightly but he doesn’t retort. He could, though. He could bring up that Harry stayed on longer in London. He did coffee dates with people he had seen just last week and shopped for antiques to gather dust in his new house in London that he’ll stay in three weeks of the year. It’s what makes Harry bite his tongue. They’ve only got a few hours together. He’s not going to be the one to fuck it up. 

“Let’s go on up,” Harry suggests. Niall nods, his shoulders still tight. 

His bedroom looks lived in too -- the bedspread pulled back and the pillows sprawled across the mattress the way Niall gets when he’s in the bed alone. It warms him that Niall’s been staying in here while he’s been away. It looks mostly tidy -- most of Niall’s stuff all rolled up in a case at the bottom of the stairs. 

He tries not to dwell, kisses Niall instead to take his mind off it. It’s just that he doesn’t know when he’ll have Niall back again, when he’ll see him without the surety of a work commitment or heading into the studio. It’s gutting to think of the break that way. It’s supposed to be a positive thing, he reminds himself.

“Clothes off,” Harry forces himself to say, pushing the thought away again. Niall laughs brightly, leaning back to pull off his t-shirt. 

Harry does the same, popping the buttons on his jeans and kicking them off as Niall lies back on the bed to wriggle out of his. Niall stretches his way up the bed and he looks long, his bare legs half hanging off the end. Harry’s mouth feels wet and he stands, takes in the length of him with a few quiet uneven breaths. 

He’s missed him. He will miss him.

“C’mere,” Niall says, hand reaching up towards him. His voice is strangely soft and Harry wonders what his expression is, if Niall can read how much this apparently means to him. Harry lets out a breath and tries to ignore how it catches slightly. Niall offers him a smile.

“You’re still tan,” Niall says appraisingly when Harry drops his shirt to the floor and kneels onto the mattress between Niall’s thighs. It’s the only mention that Niall makes to Harry’s New Year holiday and a little part of Harry wishes he would ask more. Say more. 

They should talk about it --

\-- but “Yeah,” is all Harry can say. 

Niall presses his thumbs into Harry’s side, slides his palms up over his hips to settle at his waist. They’re warm and sure as they move, too well practised with Harry’s body for his touch to be anything but familiarly firm. 

Harry wants to cover every inch of Niall’s body with his own, he wants to roll them over and have Niall press him into the mattress, he wants to kiss and to touch and have and never let go. He presses his face into the warm space underneath Niall’s jaw, tastes out the sweat there as he nips his teeth down over his skin. 

He wants and he wants and he knows that that’s half the problem. 

“Christ,” Niall says, threading his fingers into Harry’s hair. It’s longer than ever before and Harry’s sort of regretting the decision to grow it out but Niall makes a fist with his hand and tugs his head back. “Get out of your head for a moment,” Niall says, too serious for how he usually sounds in bed. “And start kissing me properly.”

Harry nods, leans in to lick across his mouth. The kiss is sloppy -- they normally are between them because there’s no need to impress each other. Harry loves it. Loves that Harry can do what he likes and not feel immediately self-conscious about it. 

“What do you want?” Niall asks on the end of a breathless kiss. He’s slowly but steadily working his hips up against Harry’s stomach, his dick pressing damply at Harry’s skin. He has a knee pulled up over Harry’s hip and it feels like he’s everywhere. Harry sinks into it, feels the tacky friction of their hot skin against each other. 

Harry’s answer is immediate, “You.”

Niall rolls his eyes, the way he always does when Harry says that. He’s too indecisive -- he wants to fuck Niall, leave his lasting impression on him so he’ll only be able to think of Harry for days but he also wants the other way, flat on his back so he can see Niall above him and for Niall to fuck him so hard he’ll feel it long after he’s gone. He’s greedy. He’s wanting again.

Niall wriggles away, his leg flailing as he tries to get it up over Harry’s side as he rolls over onto his stomach to reach for where Harry keeps the lube and condoms. Harry lets him go, pressing his hands to the pale skin on Niall’s arse and pulling him apart just enough that he can see the pinker skin hiding between his arsecheeks. 

Niall groans, his arm still stretched up above his head. The muscles of his back shift as Harry presses his thumb against the sensitive skin just behind his balls. He rubs there a moment before ghosting the pad of his thumb over Niall’s hole. “Nah,” Niall says but he’s breathless and panting as he rolls over, squirming away from Harry’s teasing touches. “I’ve got to sit for like fifteen hours.”

“That’s the idea,” Harry says, grinning at him. Niall laughs, bright and cheerful. Harry wants to bottle it so he can crack it open sometime in the future. He feels he might need it. 

Instead, Harry finally loses his underwear and sprawls out beside him on the bed, face pressed into a pillow so he can bite at the material as Niall works one then two then three fingers inside him. Niall goes slow, draws it out until Harry’s pressing his arse into the air to chase Niall’s hand. Niall doesn’t give in, just bites at the skin on the back of Harry’s hips, kiss at the curve of his arse like he does when he gets particularly distracted. 

The first time they’d done this they had been a little stupid and a lot drunk. Harry had ended up with more lube dripping down his thighs than inside him and Niall’d balked half way through, curling his fingers into his palm, redfaced and refusing to do it ever again. Neither of them had come and Harry ended up staring at the ceiling feeling very sober and like he’d just ruined his entire life. It sometimes still makes him feel hot in the cheeks, that residual embarrassment that’s always going to lurk under the surface, even though the night had ended with Niall rolling into his side just before they dropped off, his arm pulling him into a tight hug. It was formative and important in a way that neither of them really understood until months later when they gave it another go -- just as drunk but this time more comfortable in what they wanted from each other, in what the other could give them. 

Harry can't predict the future. He doesn't know that tomorrow afternoon -- late back home -- Grimmy'll send him an advance copy of Pillow Talk with the express warning that body parts will be detached if he leaks it. He doesn't know that in three weeks time, Harry'll choke on a flake of Special K that he shouldn't be eating anyway because it's too much sugar and fly home to his mum because he thinks he's had a near death experience. He doesn't know that from that, the weeks will stretch on and he'll not hear from Niall until well after Easter. There will be rumours and headlines and two very different albums with Harry's name attached put into the works. Harry will grow. And Harry will pine. He'll pour his heart into his notebook and then lose it on a plane. Rumours and headlines. Headlines and rumours.

Niall will come home. Eventually.

But Harry doesn't know any of that yet. He only knows what's happening now with Niall's delicate fingers wrapped around the base of his dick -- as if that'll stop him giving into the feel of every inch of Niall shifting inside him, the push of his hips and press of his hands. He only knows everything that’s built them up to this point, that swell in his chest whenever they’re together.

Harry gasps into the pillow, a throaty sob that sounds raw as his orgasm rips through him. He feels it to the ends of his hair, a long and wanting whine the only way he can adequately express himself. It doesn't seem enough -- he feels on fire and liquid at the same time, a molten fizz of blood and muscle as everything inside him rearranges itself. Behind him, Niall moans and then Harry knows he's coming, his fingers going tight at Harry's hip and smearing his come over his skin. 

Niall disappears behind him for a moment, probably getting rid of the condom. The light is fading outside and Harry wonders how they’ve managed to spend the entire afternoon up here. He feels wrung out like he’s exhausted himself but it still feels entirely too short a time with Niall. He sighs, stretches out his tired muscles and closes his eyes. 

When he opens them again, Niall’s already dressed. He has a quiet smile on his face and a gentle touch to Harry’s forehead. He must’ve fallen asleep again, his head groggy as he pieces together Niall’s clean t-shirt and the sunglasses perched on his head. 

“Please,” Harry finds himself begging. He’s not even ashamed about it, something burning urgently in his veins. He grips at Niall’s wrist, feels the warm pump of blood there. “Please don’t go.”

Niall’s not looking at him, his gaze fixed on the embroidery on the duvet cover. “I’ll see you later,” Niall promises, glancing back at him with that same sure smile. 

“I’ll give you a lift,” Harry says, flailing over onto his back. He feels sticky and still half asleep, the urgency to get up and go making him panic. He can drive him to the airport and see him off, soak in those final few minutes.

Niall laughs a little, reaching over to push his hand back into Harry’s sweaty hair. “There’s a pile of us.” He pauses so Harry can hear the commotion of Niall’s friends downstairs. All of them gathering themselves for the next part of their adventure. Their voices echo in Harry’s cavernous atrium hallway and the house has never felt so full. “Car’s here.”

Harry sucks in a breath, so suddenly he thinks he could choke. He tries not to think of Niall waiting until the last moment to say goodbye. 

“Bye,” Niall says softly, leaning in to kiss him. Harry grips at his shirt -- one that must belong to Harry -- and pulls him as close as he can. He smells clean and his hair is still a bit damp from the shower. Harry tastes the mint toothpaste. It feels like all these little details should be important but Harry won’t remember. “See you soon.”

Harry doesn’t say anything, drags him back down into a crushing hug. Niall tenses for a moment, letting out a squeak of a laugh before he’s sinking into it. 

It’s a long break stretching out in front of them. 

And Harry will miss him.


End file.
